Daily Mains Practice Questions 06-01-2023

KINDLY REVIEW

KINDLY REVIEW

KINDLY REVIEW

1) KEY POINTS

·        Policy makers too appear quite insouciant, resulting in India featuring near the bottom of the pile in old-age social security coverage.

·        The life expectancy in India in 1998 was 61.7 according to the World Bank. It had improved to 70.1 by 2020 with residents of some States such as Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra having life expectancy well above the national average.

·        Rapid strides have been taken by other countries in improving social protection in old age for their citizens.

·        According to OECD’s ‘Pensions at a Glance 2021’ report, the global average retirement age for a man working from the age of 22 was 64.2 years in 2020.

·        Also, as the Economic Survey 2018-19 pointed out, “all major States are projected to witness a decline in the share of young population and an increase in the share of elderly population over the next two decades.

·        The way out could be to provide an option to the employees around the current retirement age to either take voluntary retirement or to continue working.

·        Many organisations are already providing VRS options for employees beyond a certain age. Such options ensure that extension of working years does not prove burdensome to those who do not want it.

2) KEY POINTS

·        In a recent verdict, the Supreme Court has shown sound restraint while examining the issue of misuse of free speech, especially by political functionaries holding public office.

·        It is to the credit of the Constitution Bench that it did not make any adventurous attempt to expand the scope of the restrictions already spelt out in the Constitution.

·        The majority also declined to expand the notion of ‘collective responsibility’ to fix liability on the state for such remarks.

·        While the issue is largely academic, there have indeed been instances of courts taking note of individual ministers’ public remarks to transfer sensitive investigations.

·        In the course of the discussion, the court has restated and clarified several principles, including that of constitutional tort, or a civil wrong that is actionable.

·        The main opinion concludes that a mere statement by a minister that goes against an individual’s fundamental rights may not be actionable, but becomes actionable if it results in actual harm or loss.

·        The court’s overall view that fundamental rights are enforceable even against private actors is indeed a welcome one.

·        This largely settles the question of whether these rights are only ‘vertical’, that is, enforceable only against the state, or ‘horizontal’ too, that is enforceable by one person against another.

3) KEY POINTS

·        There have been two major developments in the television industry in India in the last two years.

·        In 2022, the Union Cabinet approved the policy guidelines for the uplinking and downlinking of television channels from India.

·        While an uplink refers to the link from a ground station up to a satellite, a downlink is the link from a satellite down to one or more ground stations or receivers.

·        The amended Cable Television Network Rules bring in a strong institutional system for redressing grievances and make broadcasters and their self-regulating bodies accountable and responsible.

·        The policy guidelines for uplinking and downlinking are aimed at making India the hub of uplinking as they allow Indian teleports to uplink foreign channels.

·        In order to regulate this burgeoning cable network industry and to make registration of cable operators mandatory, the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act, 1995 was brought in.

·        The satellite invasion began in the country in the early 1990s and the cable industry acted as a harbinger of the new media revolution.

·        The MIB issued uplinking and downlinking policy guidelines in 2011 for private satellite TV channels and teleports.

·        From the days when Indian broadcasters were flying tapes to foreign countries for uplinking to the times when foreign broadcasters would send their programmes to Indian teleports for uplink.

Q.3) uplink and downlink